Northern Lights illuminate the sky in spring, autumn

By Meena Thiruvengadam / Special to the Express-News

Updated 10:10 am, Sunday, April 24, 2011

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Thingvellier National Park, situated in a rift vallery where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet, is a popular place from which to view the northern lights. COURTESY RAGNER TH. SIGURDSSON

Thingvellier National Park, situated in a rift vallery where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet, is a popular place from which to view the northern lights. COURTESY RAGNER TH. SIGURDSSON

REYKJAVIK, Iceland – My quest for the northern lights began a year ago under clouds in Canada.

As I sat night after night with my fancy new camera in Iqaluit, just south of the Arctic Circle, I hoped to see the flashes of the aurora borealis, the beautiful byproduct of charged atomic particles colliding in the earth's magnetic field.

I saw clouds. But along with disappointment grew my determination to one day see the phenomenon. And that brought me to Iceland.

The lights are best spotted in the auroral zone, which forms a wide ring around the Earth's northern magnetic pole.

The likelihood of spotting the northern lights in Iceland is so good that throngs of tourists visit each year. On clear nights between September and April, busloads of tourists journey from Iceland's capital to national parks, roadside stops and resorts built for gazing.

While the lights can also be spotted in places including Alaska, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia and Canada, I chose Iceland because it offered pretty good odds at a reasonable price with a great side benefit: the chance to explore a country I knew little about.

On my first night in Iceland, a friend, his daughter and I were situated on the side of the road outside the city at a spot they had visited many times.

“Look there,” he said, pointing through the dark toward a mountain.

A stretch of faint green danced in the sky above me. It grew brighter, then a green ray shot out from behind the mountains and over the road. The rays morphed and danced across the road and over the water. And then the sky went dark again.

It was March, one of the darker — and therefore better — months to catch the light show. I had happened to arrive on the first good night for northern lights chasing in a while. U.S. Space Weather Prediction Center forecasts had suggested strong potential for the natural light show.

A few nights later, with another good forecast, I found myself on another roadside, gazing at dancing green lights above. This time I was with my sister and a pair of new friends, a videographer and a photographer keen on sharing the lights with the world.

We continued our journey to Thingvellir National Park, where North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet. The park is home to the country's largest natural lake and once housed parliament.

We set up cameras waited through a cold winter night. And waited. And waited. A few faint rays of green later, the clouds set in, and we packed up.

To see the lights, the situation has to be just right. That means no overcast skies or city lights, just dark. The best views are typically between 8 p.m. and 1 a.m. from September to April.

During my six nights in Iceland, I spotted the northern lights twice.

In between, I took a dip in the Blue Lagoon, a geothermal spa complete with silica mud masks and a sauna. I went for a snowmobile ride on a glacier, watched geysers erupt and spent a couple of nights on the main drag, Laugavegur, where clubs stay open until 5 a.m. on weekends.

I took a ride past the house that hosted a 1986 arms summit between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, and I took an elevator to the top of the 244-foot tower of Hallgrimskirkja church for a postcard-perfect view of the city, and I enjoyed dinner at Perlan, the city's revolving restaurant.